New Year New You 2020: Week 21 – Glamour In the Apocalypse

I’m (once again) doing Miss Sugar’s New Year New You Experiment in Radical Magical Transformation because I find it’s a really good way to kick my own ass into getting things done. It’s a good mix of practical, magical, and thought-based exercises to help accomplish specific and significant change in your own life. If it’s relevant to your interests, give it a try!

Next World Tarot – Nine of Cups – A femme in a one-shouldered mini dress and studded ankle bracelets noshes on grapes while siting on a big cushion amongst the ruins of capitalism

Tarot Card: The Nine of Water
I chose this card because (1) it’s aaaaall about Wishes Coming True, but also (2) this card, in this specific deck is literally a reminder to Stay Glamourous which, in these days of “business-casual on top, pajamas on the bottom” (why, yes, my new remote job does involve weekly zoom meetings, how did you know?) and avoiding leaving the house unless you’re out of milk and toilet paper, can be a very helpful reminder. Perhaps you, too, have joined the Plague Couture facebook group or are posting Hawt Apocalyptic Lewks on Instagram.

As-you-know-bob, I’ve been having a LOT of wishes come true of late. A LOT of big magic that I did earlier this year, or late last year, has started coming to fruition which is as exciting as it is validating, let me tell you.
I had originally expected to write this post much earlier in the year, while Ms Sugar’s latest course was still running. The Plan had been to save up enough toonies to march into Sephora and buy a fancy lipstick that reflected my goals in more than one capacity, and was a colour I would actually wear on the regular (this is key), and then enchant it towards those goals.
But, HEY! We got a global pandemic, all my outside of the house gigs got canceled, and I hadn’t landed that second remote job yet, so I did an Austerity instead, and here we are, nine days before Beltane, and the question of “What do you see yourself doing in your picture of success?” …doesn’t look different, but a lot of things feel more concrete.

I imagined wading into the Atlantic while at my brother’s (now zoom-based, yes actually) wedding and, instead, I jumped off a curb and felt the asphalt ripple like water when I landed.
I imagined walking to various different jobs most days and, instead, I’m doing very-part-time remote work (Woo-hoo! Success!) and anticipating taking the bus – or maybe riding a bicycle? – to get to my modeling and (occasional) reception gigs once things eventually (fingers crossed) re-open and we’ve all been vaccinated against the Rona.
I imagined wearing Fancy Lipstick to signal The Universe that I’m ready to receive and, instead, I’m using my sewing and mending skills to turn donated t-shirts into a modern-day palla and scrap cotton into four-layer face masks, while rejoicing that I – with my remaining remote income – am finally eligible to apply for the Emergency Benefit (and tithing 10% of it to various local emergency funds and charities, because I’m miraculously able to do so) and prepping to move into a house that arrived via a friend of a friend and is miraculously actually within our price range.

Right now, “dressing for my future” looks like wearing protective clothing when I go outside, because I want us to have a future. But it also means recognizing (again) how much I love being able to spend all day in my bathrobe and so deciding ( reminding myself) that my “outside clothes” need to include more wrap-dresses, flowinggowns, shifts, shawls, and flannel.
Right now, imagining what I’m doing in my Fabulous Art-Sex-Magic Life means planning what to pack, when, and where to put it in the new place. It means saying YES PLEASE when friends offer us packing boxes or big, garden-moving flower pots, even though we have nowhere to comfortably put them yet, because we’re going to need them nine days from now. But it also means dreaming the sewing corner in the future Spare Bedroom where my dress-maker’s dummy and Janice (the domestic sewing machine) will have a permanent set-up, and how the extra book cases and basement storage unit that we’re getting with our new place can be used to give all of our stuff a proper home to go to that’s Away.
It means finishing my Austerity so that, when Beltane comes, I can look into a home-delivered CSA to help keep us in veggies while I figure out how to food-garden in the shade. It means dreaming the dry goods I’ll be restocking on and imagining the kitchen of our new home as one that features home-made yoghurt, half a pig in our chest freezer, jars of dried and tinctured herbs from our garden, jars of choke cherry jam from the trees I plan to stealth-plant in our shady back yard and fruit butter from the wild apple tree that multiple people have already told me is growing in my soon-to-be-neighbourhood, bags of seasonal baby greens augmented with sorrel and nasturtiums from the front yard, bags of flour and barley, lentils and rice noodles, lining our pantry shelves, and both a nicely stocked wine shelf and a fridge-&-freezer featuring good cheese, smoked fish, and trout fillets, mackerel steaks, home-frozen local veggies, good quality ice cream and wild-harvested berries.
It means showing up for my remote jobs and checking in with my modeling clients, and using as much of that Emergency Benefit money as I can manage to pay down credit card debt so that, when I’m dressing for my future, that future doesn’t involve three-figure minimum payments and money anxiety.

A long time ago, Ms Sugar wrote about Glamour in the Apocalypse and how it only works if you’re bringing your whole self to the table. The Scorpio Sun that needs intensity and sensuality and Go Deep or Don’t Bother Me, that’s been driving for this weird art-sex-magic life for the last twelve years and the Cancer Moon that needs safety and stability and a reliable home base to return to and hole up in.
Right now, my Empress Project goals – that I laid out more than two years ago – as well as the more material/finance-specific elements of the Empress that I started focusing on (relatively) morerecently, feel very-much within my reach. Some of them are being achieved right now, others are… okay, still a work in progress, but there IS noticeable progress, and others are solidly on their way (my two remote jobs are contract jobs – one might end at the end of May – though that seems unlikely – and the other is covering someone’s parental leave and so is temporary, even if it’s a long version of temporary. So I’m not out of the woods. But I’ve got some reprieve and a chance to develop some extra bonus skills while I’m at it, so).
Even sitting here, surrounded by moving boxes, wearing a fluffy (but jewel-tone turquoise) robe, and with a half-finished sewing project taking up the other side of the couch, it feels really good to be where I’m at right now. It feels SO good to see this stuff coming to fruition.